Gangsters search for Asian links

OUTLAW motorcycle gangsters crushed in Australia by relentless police action have shifted operations offshore, carving up Asia for dozens of new chapters and clubhouses.

It’s so bad in Thailand, authorities have begun to deploy an extraordinary paramilitary response.

And the Thais are set to go further with legislative changes to go after Outlaw Motor Cycle Gangs as proscribed organised crime groups, reviewing their visas and launching legal challenges to their wealth gained from apparently no work.

With minimal noise, leading figures from seven Australian OMCGs have moved overseas, recruiting locals to bolster their numbers and regional influence, and plotting to control sex and vice industries, massage and tattoo parlours, gyms and fitness centres and in some cases large-scale drugs trafficking.

An investigation by News Corp Australia has found that in Thailand alone, 36 chapters have been established by Australianled or affiliated OMCG members. Chapters have also been established in Indonesia, Cambodia, Singapore through shelf companies, and soon also Laos and Vietnam – while in Japan there is vidence OMCG Australian affiliates have linked with the fearsome Yakuza.

An “Asian chapter” led by Australians and Germans is being set up also in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.

Having arrested three Australian suspects last week, the Thais are prepping an elite paramilitary unit of the Thai Royal Police for further raids.

Fears of extortion and intimidation had already been reported by Thai communities to local police.

Australian Federal Police organised crime manager Commander Bruce Hill declined to go into specifics but said the AFP was working closely with Thai counterparts who now understood the “exponential” OMCG growth and danger.

Taskforce Storm is the only bilateral police operation of its type in Thailand. It links with four critical divisions of Thai law enforcement and in 18 months has seized more than 3000kg of drugs in both Thailand and Australia.